Confluence
by LandBeyondtheForest
Summary: An inescapable feeling draws Knives and Vash to a plant at the northern reaches of Gunsmoke. There they find something that they never could have imagined.


Confluence

One

* * *

Vash the Stampede was meditating.

Birds chirped cheerfully and sunlight poured in from the open window. In the distance he could hear the shouts and laughter of children. As he sat there, the scent of fresh coffee and something that might have been donuts drifted into the room. He smiled.

It was a good day.

With a grunt, Nicholas D. Wolfwood stirred in the bed next to his. The pair had been travelling together for close to a month now.

Almost instinctually the priest reached for a cigarette, without even sitting up.

"Morning, _tongari_," he croaked in a voice still thick with sleep.

"I want to get going today. If we hurry we can get to North in a couple weeks' time," said Vash simply.

"All business this morning are we?" replied Wolfwood.

"Not really," said Vash. "I'm going to say goodbye to the kids after breakfast and then we can get going."

"We'll easily be here half the day if you do that. But you owe it to them. I bet they haven't had as much fun in the past year as they do hog-tying you."

"Right?" said Vash with a small smile. "But I won't take too long. They're getting better at it, so…"

"I still don't understand what exactly you're expecting to find in North City," choked Nicholas all of a sudden, in between drags on his cigarette. "And I don't think you know either, so what's with the rush?"

Vash just sat there, pensive and quiet for a moment before replying.

"I told you I can't explain it. It's just a feeling I have."

"Is it…him?"

"I can't say."

Silence passed between them.

"Those are bad for you, you know," said Vash, wrinkling his nose a bit at the cigarette smoke that was harshing his donut-mellow.

"Traveling with the Humanoid Typhoon is worse for me," muttered the priest with a smirk.

Vash sighed. Really it was a good day.

* * *

High noon saw the two men out on the street in front of the inn, attracting a crowd as per usual, with Vash scolding Nicholas for his latest cut-loose administration of divine justice.

"What are you doing? You can't just go around roughing up the towns people. We're gonna get kicked out of town by a mob….again," whined Vash.

"So what am I supposed to do, _tongari_?" quipped Nicholas. "Just sit there and let those guys make off with my bike? Love and peace only goes so far."

Vash looked at him like a wounded dog.

"What kind of a priest…"

"Look, I didn't start it!" snapped Nicholas.

"Well you sure finished it," plied Vash with a shake of his head.

Vash turned to survey the damage in Wolfwood's wake. Three men lie scattered across the road with bloody, though light, wounds and bewildered expressions plastered across their faces. Vash figured that it was pride rather than actual injury that had them frozen and dazed on the ground. Inside the combination saloon and inn where the pair had been sitting there were several overturned tables and broken chairs. Vash shrank to half his size when the elderly landlady marched straight up to him giving him the evil eye.

"Alright! Out! Get Out!" she yelled in his face.

"Hey wait a minute," whined Vash, "it wasn't me at all. It was all him. Why do I gotta take the fall?" he said while wagging his whole arm in Wolfwood's direction.

"I know now, I've seen you before. Everywhere you go, trouble follows. Out with ye both!" snapped the old crone.

From behind her came a couple of young men lugging what little personal effects Vash and Wolfwood owned, dumping them unceremoniously at the men's feet before the old landlady slammed the doors in both their faces.

Vash sagged and turned around to face Wolfwood, who looked a little out of sorts perhaps but otherwise quite content with a crumpled cigarette hanging from one side of his mouth.

"Maybe I was a little rash," he said, picking up the huge cross and slinging it across his back. "Well, we're on the road now!"

Vash slapped him upside the head.

* * *

Silence.

Elendira the Crimsonnail was surrounded on all sides by crushing silence. Outside the main chamber of the plant, there wasn't even the constant hum of the bulb. Knives was inside with the plant and she was left outside keeping watch. Elendira tapped her painted nails on the table just to break the infernal silence. Behind her, the corpse of the night monitor was beginning to annoy her. Ahead of her, the glow from the plant bulb was eerie, even to her.

She had been accompanying Knives on an ever-broadening journey north. They had begun searching in Inepril but soon they had visited almost every city in a line northwards. They stopped at every plant looking for…something. Elendira wasn't entirely sure what Knives was doing and why she should accompany him, but then she never was.

Being around Knives was like playing with fire, she thought. To be honest it thrilled her to know that if it weren't for her particular skill set Knives would probably have killed her a long time ago. He still might.

Knives reappeared from the main chamber with a serious look and Elendira stood.

"It's not this one," he said. "It's not here."

Elendira nodded slowly. "Then we're going to North."

"Yes," he replied curtly.

For months something had been drawing Knives further north. It had begun as a small prickle against his consciousness, like a feeling of nausea. Before long the presence grew. There was a definite other consciousness teasing his mind. He could tell that it must be coming from another plant, it must be one of his sisters.

"Is it…him?" Elendira asked.

"No," said Knives. He closed his eyes as if he were concentrating, listening hard for something in the distance. "No. He's my own blood. I would know him."

* * *

Vash sighed. He sat on the bus and tried to enjoy the cool night breeze blowing through his hair and drying the sweat on his brow. Wolfwood dozed in the seat next to him.

Vash stretched his neck against the feeling pulling at his consciousness.

"What is it?" thought Vash. "What is this feeling?"

He felt the familiar bristle along the back of his neck. It was a small sensation that seemed to expand up and out of him and forward. Forward to the north. He couldn't tell precisely where the feeling was coming from, which is why he and Wolfwood had had to keep travelling northward. But North City was the end of the line as the northern most city on the planet, so far as Vash knew. Beyond it there was only an endless desert. He had to find what was calling him so intently there.

He thought back to what Wolfwood had asked him in the morning. Was it _him_? Vash had felt Knives's consciousness before and it never manifested in this new way. Still it could be him if something had happened that had changed his brother in some way, the way the feel of his brother's mind had changed to him after July.

Vash sighed again, thinking about that time in the past.

But that time his brother had triggered Vash's angel arm and caused him to obliterate the entirety of Knives's lower body, more than likely. He couldn't imagine what could happen to his brother that wasn't caused by some manifestation of plant power.

Something that was his fault. Whatever it was, it made him uneasy.

The bus hit a bump and Wolfwood snored loudly, bringing Vash out of his reverie.

* * *

A/N: Sorry about the brevity of this first chapter. I'm still getting the hang of writing something more than a one-shot. Please do review if you're so inclined.


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